NEW DELHI:Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS operating systems matter the most in the industry, while other operating systems like Windows and BB10 will die down over a period of time, according to Kirt McMaster, the CEO and co-founder of Cyanogen. He also said that operating systems have been commoditized globally.

In an interaction with ET’s Danish Khan, McMaster talks about the future of operating systems, Cyanogen’s expansion plans and product roadmap. Edited excerpts

How do you look at the operating system landscape?

There are only two operating systems that matter—Android and iOS. Firefox just died, others will die gruesome deaths that still remain. At the end of the day, these forks of Android or alternative operating systems are Android only.

I reckon that operating systems have been commoditized.

Android and iOS is fundamentally the same thing and people interact with applications. We are more focused on what arises on top of the existing operating system.

We see operating system as a component of the products and enable us to get observations into the users to make the services more intelligent. Operating systems that exist today are not the kinds of computing paradigms that we will see tomorrow. We think new things will evolve on top of Android.

A lot of vendors are claiming that they have their own OS, but in reality it’s just Android. They are making a huge mistake while not seeing what is coming next.

We believe that machine intelligence will arise on top of an open computing platform. Cyanogen is opening up the Android platform to enable the new experiences to arise, which creates more observations, more signals and enables this intelligence to emerge. As intelligence emerges, you start to get radical experiences that are just not possible today.

We are not an operating system company. We see ourselves as machine Intelligence Company.

Which company is your biggest competitor?

Currently only Google is making investments in this space. Apple is lucky to be a more mature market phenomenon. It can take really strong privacy stances but when you take really strong stances on privacy, you limit the observations as a company. With less access to observation and signal, it’s hard to create intelligence that can further integrated into services.

Facebook too is making big investments, but they don’t have a mobile platform other than the app.Google really uses Android as a way to get observations. That’s the smartest way to collect intelligence. Google wants to be a machine intelligence company. We have to say that Google is our competition.

Nobody else has an operating system at scale that can collect all the data on what users are doing.

What is main crucial element of Cyanogen that appeals the most to consumers?

Historically, it’s been features that we have done on top of Android. But again that appeals to enthusiasts. We think what appeals to mass consumer is new kind of experiences that makes their lives easier, and enables them to do more with fewer clicks on phone.

How has been the journey since the first launch in India?

It’s been good. We are going to expand in India aggressively in 2016. You can expect to see a lot more of us next year. We have opened up our Bengaluru office and hired vice president of engineering Qualcomm to head the team. The focus of the team is to build new products, besides focusing on business development in India. Here, we are not just working on India as well as global initiatives.

Our Bengaluru team has 11 people, which will grow up to 60 people by the end of 2016 year.We will be announcing a bunch of disruptive products in the Mobile World Congress 2016. A lot of engineering behind these products will be done by the Indian team.

What are the targets for the Indian market?

We have aggressive targets for the Indian market. There are millions of Cyanogen users in India right now. We initially launched with Micromax’s Yu in India for the first year. Now, we will be working with more OEMs in 2016 in India. You probably see more than six domestic and international vendors launching devices running Cyanogen in India.

However, we will continue our work with Yu. We have plans not only to continue to collaborate here but elsewhere in the world with Micromax.

Cyanogen recently raised funding from various investors including Premji ventures. Are you using those funds to expand in India?

Absolutely! The big focus of the financing was to expand in India. It’s the fastest growing mobile market in the planet and we are here to support it.

Does Cyanogen plan to invest in Indian startups?

We would like to invest in companies around the world that are doing unique thing and providing value to customers. We are obviously looking at several companies locally.

We would love to meet entrepreneurs and technology companies that have great technologies local to India.

Currently, there’s no specific Cyanogen fund for this. We have been considering something like that to fund startups not just in India but globally. If we find something good that can move the needle, we would seriously think in terms of investments and acquisitions here.

Are you now targeting the mass market through new partnerships with handset vendors?

One of the reasons we partnered with Micromax because they understand the market and consumers in India. There’s no question, through this partnership, we can attract the mass market. It’s really important for Cyanogen to go beyond the enthusiasts’ community. We want to take the value of this community to mass market.

Cyanogen earlier showed interest in tying up with Indian startups for integration purposes. Please give an update on that.

We are developing a platform which will be a result of some of such partnerships. It’s a global thing, and we will be announcing this next year. You will see a lot of Indian ecosystem players working with us. It’s to enable local ecosystem developers to create things that are impossible right now.

What are the new developments one can expect from Cyanogen?

There’s a really a big stuff coming over the next 12-18 months. First announcement will be made at the MWC. We will launch things the really represent the post app era like platforms and machine intelligence that begin to arise on top of Android.

Is Cyanogen looking at other form factors beyond smartphones to power?

Guardian had an article a few days ago that said smartphones will disappear in five years. That’s not the case-- smartphones are going to be here for a very long period of time. It’s the Android all the growth is coming from, and most of that is coming from the emerging markets. Android will continue to evolve. Things will emerge on top of Android. For all purposes are different on Android,New kind of user experiences and intelligent operating systems are going to supersede the platform that we are built on top of that. That being said these things are extensible to other kinds of devices, such as wearables, automotives, televisions etc. We do see these as future, but, our focus will remain focused on smartphones.

It’s just begun and started to warm up and we are going to see billions of users on these devices in couple of years. We want to evolve the smartphone platform first and foremost because that is going to be the driver of all these other platforms.

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